Not Getting Scammed

This guide was provided by lady_mercury, and was originally posted on the JE Sales Community and the EGL Community on 11/12/08. It was edited with permission for optimized viewing by talia_speaks.

There are cases where you might get a legitimate seller, but regardless, everyone should take caution. If it looks shady, take caution. You would rather have security than uncertainty.

1) Finding the Sale

(click for larger image)

When finding the sale, you have to look at the post. Does it have a picture of the product advertised? Does it not? If it doesn’t have any pictures, then it might be a good idea to stay away from that sale, or ask if the seller has any proof of ownership. Otherwise, it might be a scam. It is pretty hard to buy something if there are no pictures of the items you are buying. You are basically hoping and trusting that the send you what they said they were selling.

No, its the internet. Things don’t work like that. If you’re not going to shop like that on eBay and be more aware there then you need to be triple aware when shopping on content management systems like Livejournal.

2) Make Sure the Pictures Are Not Taken From a Site like Yahoo! Auctions or from another sale

One major thing to look out for is pictures. If it looks too small, or clean, or simply out of the ordinary, than it could possibly be a stolen image. I like looking for sales that have nice big pictures of every single thing that they’re selling, like this seller, whom I bought four magazines from and had a great transaction with. All the magazines were well layed out, well taken care of, listed correctly, and priced reasonably.

Johnny’s puts a clear ban on their talent’s images online — If you see that their face is covered, the picture is blurry, etc etc… It was could have been yanked from an Yahoo! Japan Auction. The majority of the pictures from those auctions are distorted due to the image ban. Sellers also remove the image after the sale is over. Take that into consideration.

So when you are looking at images, you should definitely look for images that were clearly taken in the home of the seller, and that they are not blurry or photoshopped.

3) Check Their User Activity

Check their activity. If it’s being sold in a personal journal and they have under 10 posts, you might get scammed. LJ lets you know how many posts have been made on a journal, whether the entries are friends only or not. So if you look at the journal and only see the sales post, check their journal stats — you’ll see how active they are. Now this could be different if the seller in question only uses their journal usernames for posting in communities. Most people that do that have maybe one entry in their journal, a feedback post at most.

If they run a sales journal, this won’t help you much, but look for other sales, read the user comments. Get a feel for the seller. If you see a lot of satisfied people then they’re a good seller. If they’re selling for the first time on a “personal” journal and only have “one or two” posts, it could be a sock puppet account and you might get scammed.

Sock Puppet, for those who don’t understand, are LJ accounts that have no account activity but are usually used to troll or just cause harm anonymously.

Okay, people must be confused about the seller/personal journal. Here’s an example.

yamapi_wife69 is holding a great sale. Unbelievable sale, CDs for 10 dollars, clippings for 3 dollars a page, and seems to just have that one thing you’re looking for. You’ve never seen this person around the community, never seen them post, never seen them comment. But they’re selling stuff and you want it. Well, you look at their user stats.

1 post, which is the sellers post.
0 comments recieved or posted, unless its equal to the comments in the sellers entry.

This is a clear sign TO BE WARY of this seller.

jin_store is holding another great sale, around the same prices for everything and has that one thing you’re looking for. You CAN’T rely on the other stuff above you because its not a personal journal, but a sales journal so it’s going to have less activity.

Check for a feedback post, look for previous sales, find out who the seller is.

If you can’t find any of this out, BE WARY of this seller.

4) Everything apparently looks good, so I’m going to go ahead and buy it

So the seller says they prefer paypal or that they’re “paypal” only. When you go to pay, LOOK AT THEIR INFORMATION.

If they ARE NOT a verified buyer or a MEMBER SINCE 2008/2009/2010/infinity then you might get scammed. Though, this isn’t necesssarily true, as some people have more than one account to process credit card transactions, and therefore they might not be verified or a member for more than a few months. A good example of this would be my (talia_speaks) own account, which I have had since February 2008, am verified with 68 verified buyers and have a confirmed address.

THEIR ADDRESS SHOULD BE LISTED. If they do not have an address listed, you might get scammed. (also might not be true, as some accounts do not have confirmed addresses because they don’t have their credit card attached to their accounts)
THEY MUST BE VERIFIED, IF FROM THE US. Verified buyers have their account VERIFIED by PayPal, meaning they’ve provided a credit card and a bank account. If they do not have a bank account/credit card on file, then they are not a verified PayPal member.

If you run into ANY PROBLEMS with someone on Paypal -> MEANING THEY HAVE NOT SHIPPED OUT YOUR PACKAGE IN TWO WEEKS TIME, then FILE A DISPUTE WITH PAYPAL. — Though usually, its better to wait longer than two weeks, only because you have 45 days to file a dispute, and they usually tell you to wait a month before you dispute or file a claim. A dispute lasts at least three to five days. IF THE SELLER CAN NOT BE CONTACTED OR REFUSED TO SHOW PROOF OF SHIPMENT then YOU WILL BE REFUNDED YOUR MONEY AND THE SELLER WILL THEN OWE PAYPAL FOR THE FEES INCURED

This is called Paypal’s Buyers Protection. All accounts have it. USE IT. Read your Buyers Protection for more information. When filing disputes, do it over the phone. If you get no where, pressure them. Its your right, protect what’s yours.

Don’t wait A MONTH, TWO MONTHS, THREE MONTHS, A YEAR to get this done because if you do, Paypal won’t do anything for you. You have 45 DAYS FROM THE TRANSACTION TO DO IT.

Now if you paid by money order or cash, you’re SOL. Sorry.

5) Beware of Obscene Prices

I hope this information was useful to those who choose to use it. If you have anything you would like to add or expand upon, please contact the administrator.